Couple of things:

Andrew WK was awesome. Kyle wrote about it here. Photos from the event have started to show up on the Facebook event page. Chairs were swung, spontaneous dance parties erupted, and stage divers walked over the crowd. Perfect way to start the weekend.

Tonight starts the music, but before we get into that, at 6:00pm in Music Hall will be a panel and open forum on the state of the Madison music scene and how local musicians can benefit from the various resources we have in town. The panel includes Darwin Sampson from the Annex, Justin Bricco of the Blueheels, Kiki Schueller of Kiki’s House of Righteous Music , Tom Laskin from Isthmus, and Matt Gerding of The Majestic Theatre. The panel was set up by our good friend Jesse at Dane101.com and promises to be like the Daily Page forums, only real. Weird.

The Pale Young Gentlemen are awesome. Stylus agrees. Matt told us following a beautiful in studio at WSUM Tuesday that they may be premiering some new material. Looking forward to that in a major way.

Huge props to the WUD Music Committee (and last night, Distinguished Lecture Committee) for allowing this event to happen and helping regulate. As Amy said last night, meetings are Tuesdays at 5:30pm. Now go start your own music festival.

That is all. Go see live music.

Just a quick reminder to listen in to Y Control on student radio WSUM tomorrow afternoon from 2-4pm for a festival preview, featuring at least one artist in studio as well as us organizers spinning some of our favorite tracks from the artists playing this weekend. You can listen in at 91.7fm on your radio dial or streaming online at www.wsum.org.

UPDATE: For those of you who missed it, the second half of the show is streaming online at the WSUM archives here. We hope to have the first half, featuring beautiful in-studio performances by Pale Young Gentlemen and Vid Libert up very soon. We had a blast, thanks for anyone who took the time out of their day to listen in.

Huge shout-out to the fine folks at Pitchfork for making our website crash for the second year in a row. They are the first outlet that we aren’t working directly with to pick up the festival, and what better place to start than the top (though we should mention to keep your eye out for this week’s Onion and Daily Cardinal who are both prepping previews). Love ‘em or hate ‘em, there’s a reason they’re the most frequented source of music news on the net. And seriously, how can you not love this quote?

“And since the whole thing is totally free, attending the festival is just like the downloading we do every day at our computers, except with human contact. Imagine!”

Billy Harvey - The World Is On Fire (2007)

Billy Harvey mixes the subtle songwriting of Elliott Smith with the sound and sense of humor of the Eels. His songs are simple offerings crafted of human hands about watching TV, doing karate, and meeting up at the bars later. He’s heartfelt in the realistic sometimes-struggling, sometimes-quiet definition of the word - not its common overuse to promote puppy rescue. Like with all good friends, taking the time to enjoy his slow sensibility is rewarded with entertaining quirks, moments of poignant reflection, and citrus rainstorms.

Billy Harvey - Soft Blade (mp3)

*Check out his incredible, SXSW-award-winning website (seriously, it’s a piece of art) and his performance at Music Hall for Madison Pop Fest on Friday evening.

NOTE: I stole this from Kyle over at sponsor/blog JustSayinIsAll.com who is better at this then I’ll ever be.

One of the acts I’m most excited about this weekend is Montreal’s Malajube. Nominated for the first annual Polaris prize, their music was instantly accessible to me and hit like a ton of bricks. Maybe if I would have made it past first semester French I’d know what the hell they are singing about, but the fact that it is inconsequential to my appreciation of their music makes it even more enjoyable for me. I’m predicting that I’ll end up sporting a new tshirt of their’s (and maybe a new piece of vinyl) by the end of the weekend. Check out this new video they posted for not only some amazing music, but amazing film work, created using stop motion animation with found objects. I also highly suggest this Daytrotter session for a free sample of their infectious and full melodies, best suited for epic blue-gold sunsets and imploding abandoned warehouses.

Malajube play the Muzzle of Bees Showcase: 9:30pm, Saturday at the Music Hall.

Hey, want to do us a heavy? I’ve always wanted to say that. Here’s the poster for this year’s festival, click on it for the full resolution image, and if you have a printer splat her all over the places you go every day - classrooms, dorms, community centers, job sites, your bedroom - even if it’s only one or two, and make our lives A TON easier. Tons of thanks to Y Mae, who made the poster and hosts student radio WSUM’s Y Control (which we are proud to announce we’ll be on next week) on Tuesdays from 2-4pm.

Figured I’d give you a rundown on the people who put this little shindig on for you to enjoy. Shoutout to all the dudes helping put this together, it ain’t easy putting together an event like this, especially as a volunteer. If you see us this weekend say hi! Continue reading ‘get to know your organizers’

With yesterday’s news that Bon Iver had signed to Jagjaguwar, this post is almost irrelevant now; but we’ll assume you don’t read Muzzle of Bees, Pitchfork, or Brooklyn Vegan religiously like we do. We realize that a lot of you are probably wondering who most of the acts we have on our bill are. After all, there are plenty of other great (though not free) options around town this weekend, what makes us think that we are worth your time or patronage? Luckily as a free festival without the impetus to make money, we are able to present shows that we like and deem worthy of their position on a bill, despite their status in the music scene today or their rank on any charts. We hope, in the least pretentious way possible, that you’ll take a chance and extend yourself to see something this weekend that you’ve never seen before.

Bon Iver’s For Emma, Forever Ago is the perfect place to start. Ryan introduced us to Eau Claire native Justin Vernon’s music quite a while back in his Homegrown series, so it is fitting that he is playing his showcase on the only full band and headlining show of his tour. When we asked him to come onboard, we contacted him directly. A day later we got an email from his new agent (the same as Joanna Newsom’s…coincidence?). A week after that, in the wake of an overwhelmingly positive review and pick from indie tastemakers Pitchfork, it is announced that he signed to release his now sold out album (streaming here) with Jagjaguwar. Now, after being one of the highlights of CMJ, he and the band return to join us for their first show in Madison at the Music Hall on November 10th.

Take a peek at this video to see what we’re talking about: Continue reading ‘bon iver’

How can we even express how happy we were today when we saw a message from Ryan today with a body of simply “YES!”? I knew what he meant, and was at least as excited. The trailer for Sigur Rós’s new film Heima is fantastic and ethereal (and wait til you see it in hidef!). Ever since seeing it, after forcefully peeling ourselves away from reruns of A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila, we’ve been fanatically trying to find a way to add it to our lineup. Today that search has come to fruition and we are happy to announce that Heima will close the MuzzleofBees.com showcase. A press release for the film follows. Keep your eyes open for start times, we should have a schedule by the end of the week.

Continue reading ‘heima’

The last time Andrew W.K. was in Madison he headlined WSUM’s Party in the Park (now Snake on the Lake Fest). He threw Kit Kats from the stage during “Give Me a Break,” and encouraged the distribution of fake blood among audience members. Then, when the weather turned sour, Andrew challenged the skies screaming, “Bring on the rain! When it rains, I get wet!” before storming into the opening notes of “I Get Wet,” as the downpour ensued. No one can be sure exactly what will happen when we confine the Wolf to four walls, but we can promise that the opening night of Madison Pop Fest will be full of destruction in the form of optimism, courtesy of your friend, Andrew W.K. Continue reading ‘andrew wk’

As you saw in our artist announcement, this year features direct partnerships with some of our favorite local bloggers. We’ve worked in coordination with www.MuzzleOfBees.com and www.JustSayinIsAll.com to produce several really spectacular showcases that will be presented in the Music Hall over the course of the weekend. Our friends over at www.Dane101.com are working right now on putting together some panel action for us as well. Keep tuned here and there for updates. A special thanks to Ryan, Kyle, and Jesse for their work in putting these together!

An exciting (aren’t they all?) addition for us this year is the inclusion of film in our little music festival. One of our goals this year is to celebrate the lifestyle of music fans, encompassing more than just music in the weekend’s festivities. In that vein, among other activities, this year’s MPF will include several great films. Check it: Continue reading ‘films’

Here’s our initial artist announcement, as usual, everything is subject to change. In our opinion this is our best lineup yet and the most consistent in terms of musical quality. A huge thanks goes out to all of the bands who are a part of this and all of the people who are helping us out. There are a few more to come, and if we can find a space and money (CAN YOU HELP US?) we have more on plate that’d we’d love to be able present in your name (unless you are Mountain Dew). We hope you’ll leave the weekend with something new to love. Anyway, in no particular order: Continue reading ‘music’

If you’ve been a part of any of our previous PopFest’s, you’re already familiar with the Great Hall and Rathskeller, but how about Music Hall? As much as we know you’ll all miss it’s homey cafeteria vibe (we know we will), Club 770’s commitments this year are with football tailgate parties, so we’ve got the opportunity to introduce you to one of our favorite, though rarely used, venues in town. Only a short walk over from the Memorial Union, it’s set to be the perfect home for our blogger showcases (more on that later). This year, though our goal has always been to make new music accessible to as many people as want to see it, due to the limitations of our venues and our interest in making sure the experience is as comfortable as it can be for those who come out, we’re going to be watched pretty closely on capacity. Please come early and see some acts you may not have heard before, know that each of them were very carefully selected. And with beer by the pitcher and Rathskeller Reubens, there’s really no need to leave anyway. Continue reading ‘venues’

Welcome to our new home on the web! This year we’re running the site blog style so that we can provide up to the minute updates and general musings on the event and the activities that will make it up. The links up top will soon be active with static pages that will have our schedule, press, and general festival info, but we really wanted to focus this year on creating a more dynamic homepage that we could use to elicit feedback from the patrons of the festival. We’d love to hear your comments (positive and negative) and suggestions and look forward to creating a positive shared experience for everyone involved. In order to post comments we ask only that you register with your first name and last initial so that we can keep the conversational personal. Enjoy!

The Madison Pop Festival is an annual music festival featuring the best music from Madison, the Midwest, the United States. Almost all events will be free and all ages, so bring the whole family. The festival is coordinated by students who are members of the WUD Music Committee and seeks to involve numerous others of like-minded community organizations.

Past performers include: Joanna Newsom, Rainer Maria, Bill Callahan, Brother Ali, Headlights, Make Believe, Maritime, Yawo and numerous other amazing artists…all for free!

Questions? Want to be a sponsor? Email us - info@madisonpopfest.com
Press Requests - press@madisonpopfest.com